


Borrowing Freedom

by Everlind



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Centaurstuck, M/M, alternate universe - centaurs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-07
Updated: 2015-01-07
Packaged: 2018-03-06 14:03:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3137060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Everlind/pseuds/Everlind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The truth is that you’re scared of horses. Okay, pants-shitting terrified would be closer. Uncle Ebaran has a farm with this big old piebald. You were about six, you think, and Tavros had given you carrot to feed. <i>Go ahead, Patches is real nice!</i> But as soon as you’d come within range good ol’ Patches had flattened her ears and bitten you. You still have the scar.</p><p>John is not a horse.</p><p>But damn if the horsey part doesn’t look exactly like a motherfucking horse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Borrowing Freedom

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Drinkers of the Wind](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1448611) by [Everlind](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Everlind/pseuds/Everlind). 



> Double Inspiration Reach Around!  
> Began with [this](http://everlind.tumblr.com/post/107323434953) Centaurstuck ask, to which [bluearturtle](http://bluearturtle.tumblr.com/) answered with [this gorgeous art.](http://bluearturtle.tumblr.com/post/107351070793/karkat-had-never-felt-so-free-yeeeee-i-got-this)  
> This is for you Suvi :D

It’s a perfect day.

Overhead the trees stretch out their gnarly limbs towards the azure sky. There’s a psychotic squirrel leaping from branch to branch, chittering in great indignation at your trespassing on its front lawn. Even though there’s no discernible trail as far as you can tell, John seems to know where he’s going. You can hardly keep up.

“Come on, Karkat! Hurry up!”

“Calm your horseshit, Seabiscuit,” you grumble, even as the sole of your sneaker slips over a mossy root and has you stumbling. “I’ve only got two damn legs.”

John strikes a bit of a pose, hind leg propped on the point of his hoof elegantly. Majestic tail swish. “I’d say I’d rate at least a Black Beauty, don’t you agree…” -pauses, looks you up and down pointedly- “Merrylegs?”

“You’re killing me, John, I’m laughing so hard as is clearly evidenced my jaunty skipping around and good natured thigh-slapping, you’re a goddamn riot, ponyboy, golly gee and gosh darn.”

“Boohoo, Crabbykat, if we go any slower we’d be going backwards. Lucky for you we’re here!”

‘Here’ still looks pretty much like ten minutes ago. Trees. Plants. Birds. It’s been a while since you’ve been in such a decidedly… _nature-y_ place. Sure, you go to the park once in a while. It has trees. A pond even! And it is completely different. Frankly you had no idea there still is such pure wildness near where you live. It took you about an hour on bike to get this far out, but you’d never have known without John to guide you.

You try to crane your head past his big black butt, but he promptly dances sideways to block your view. From the little you can see there’s more trees ahead, but bright fingers of sunshine pry through the trunks, suggesting you might be about to cross into a clearing.

“Okay so, I had this plan,” John begins, turning fully to face you. Flashes you a nervous grin. Not at all suspicious.

You raise your brow at him, looking up (and it is _up_ , a long way up, he basically towers over you). “I love this already,” you grunt, crossing your arms.

“But you gotta promise not to freak out.”

“I would never,” you deadpan. 

“Karkat, seriously. This is a totally sincere moment here, okay. Promise me you won’t flip your shit.”

“It shall remained unflipped and slightly stale,” you parrot back obligingly. 

He stares at you, nose scrunched around plain disbelief. Sighs. He’s blushing. One hand goes to his hair, carding through it, the other perches on his hip -a gesture reminiscent of hiding shaking hands in a pants pocket, slightly defensive. “I’d like you to get on my back.”

Pause.

You shake your head. “I beg your pardon.”

“You know,” he mumbles, retracting his hand from the thoroughly ruffled nest of his hair and gesturing aimlessly. “Ride me.”

“No. What, no, what the fuck _are you insane_?!”

“C’mon, you promised…”

“John, I can’t, I can’t _ride_ you, that’s— that’s—“

Wrong.

So. Fucking. Wrong.

And he knows it, the asshole.

It’s like… like… punching a baby or grabbing a girl’s breasts, but worse, so so so much worse. It’s cruel and perverse and basically the first thing a person will be told about centaurs: never ride them. Ever. Don’t even ask. Don’t even think about it because it will never happen. It’s wrong. The stigma of it is such that most of them will be offended if you so much as ask them to hold something for you, be it a book even! The mere idea of carrying something for a human is completely outrageous. The idea of carrying one unspeakable. 

“No,” you say again.

“I don’t mind, okay? I’m asking you to.”

You look at him. John’s… well, most of him is a big black stallion. The rest of him is a young kid about your age, with wayward hair and pointed ears. He flicks the right one. The two of you have become unlikely friends.

And he wants you to ride him.

It is exactly as weird as it sounds. Exactly as steeped in sexual connotations as you’d think. Oh, you can google it; ‘riding a centaur’. Sure. Most of the hits will be the weirdest sort of porn ever. The rest of them heartrending war photos from a century ago, when they were nearly wiped out in a fell swoop of bigoted genocide.

 _That’s_ how bad it is.

Porn or slaughter.

But it’s there, the fascination, despite yourself, despite everything. And fuck if you don’t _hate_ yourself for it.

“I can’t,” you repeat, and you’re pretty damn proud of how steady your voice is.

John chooses to purposefully misinterpret it. “Sure you can! Here, let’s find a tree stump or something to give you a boost.” He canters off, crunching leaves underhoof rhythmically. 

“John…” you groan, trailing after him.

Having found one, he trots a circle around it, once, twice, carefully not looking at you. “This’ll do.”

“ _John_.”

At his name, he looks at you, all big blue eyes and ears askant. “Please? I promise it’ll be awesome,” he folds his hands and tucks them under his chin. Pleading. Something in you gives, going loose and pliant. 

You shouldn’t, you know you shouldn’t. Why are you getting on the trunk? You’re on it. Why did you do that? John smiles at you, delighted, and sidles closer until his back is level with your ribs. He’s broad, and muscled, black fur dappled with shimmering coins of golden sunlight.

And you realize you’ve never touched him before. Somehow, unconsciously, despite seeking out one another’s company daily, you’ve never touched him. Not once. He’s not human, and you’re not a centaur.

Birds chirp at each other and tiny insects transform in glitters of light as they dance through sunbeams. The wind rifles through the leaves overhead, a ponderous rustling. It stirs a lock of hair into your face, which you tuck back behind your ear with shaking fingers. He’s very big.

“Sometime today, dude!” John laughs.

Swallow. Hover your hands over the line of his spine, but don’t allow them to settle. “I’ve never ridden before,” you admit.

The truth is that you’re scared of horses. Okay, pants-shitting terrified would be closer. Uncle Ebaran has a farm with this big old piebald. You were about six, you think, and Tavros had given you carrot to feed. _Go ahead, Patches is real nice!_ But as soon as you’d come within range good ol’ Patches had flattened her ears and bitten you. You still have the scar.

John is not a horse.

But damn if the horsey part doesn’t look exactly like a motherfucking horse.

“Karkat?”

“Yeah, I-“ you lay your hands on his back. He’s warm. He’s soft and solid and utterly strange. The urge to smooth your palms along with the grain of his fur is surprisingly strong. Either John is completely unaware of your utter terror or he’s cheerfully ignoring it. In case of the latter you’re really damn grateful. 

“Okay, so you can either try to do a hop and simultaneously swing your right leg over my back or you can lay down across my back on your upper belly and then swing your leg,” John says, enthusiastically orchestrating the movements with his hands.

You… sort of do both.

Thank god John is not a horse, because you all but catapult yourself over his back, would have gone down the other side head first if he hadn’t immediately swayed along with you to counterbalance your weight.

“Ffffffffuck fuck fuck _fuck_!” you huff, breathless, generally flailing and being the textbook demonstration of a worthless sack of flesh. 

“Swing your leg! Swing your leg!” John urges.

Somewhere during it all you kick him in the ribs, kick him in the hip, basically kick his ass while you’re at it, before you somehow manage to scramble upright, hair on end and heart in your throat. You nearly fucking died. Fuck. Why did you do that. You’re an idiot. Wow.

 _Wow_. You’re sitting on John. Sitting on him. Literally. The mere notion hurts your brain. “Okay,” you choke out. “Now what.”

“Uhm, scoot forward because you’re way to the back,” he speaks quickly, sounding uncomfortable.

Awkward, you walk the heels of your hands a pace or so forward, scoot your groin along his spine after them.

“Further.”

At his direction you scoot again, and again, until you’re tucked right up against the overdeveloped rise of his withers. Your dick and your balls are going to be pureed after this. Yay. Past you is a goddamn moron.

“Much better!” John says, shifting around as he balances. You can feel the powerful flex of his muscles between your thighs. Well, damn. You’re sitting on a centaur. Where do you put your hands?! Before you you have John, the broad swell of his shoulders and the strong line of his back, but— it’d be like hugging him. There’s a line of hair extending down his spine, you can see the whorls of it scrunched up under the fabric of his shirt, but you’d have to ruck it up to get at it, not to mention it’d probably hurt. Not a horse, dammit. 

In the end you delicately rest your hands on his shoulder blades.

Taking that as a go ahead, John begins to walk. You yelp in surprise as _everything_ moves and you’re helpless, have no control at all, you grip his biceps before you slide off, clinging with quite some desperation.

“Settle down, I’m not going to let you fall,” John says, and you can hear the buzz of his vocal cords against your chin.

It’s first time you’ve touched him, and somehow simultaneously the closest you have ever been to someone who is not Gamzee, or family. You can feel him _breathe_. Twice, you realize, the rise and fall of chest against yours and lower, between your legs.

Oh my god.

But then he stops, and you’re so stiff you tip forward and hit your nose on his shoulder. 

“Karkat?”

“Hm?”

“I’m not going to let you fall. I’d _never_ let you fall.” He’s not looking at you, he doesn’t need to, you’re close enough he might as well have spoken the words right up against your ear. “But you need to relax a little, okay? 

You try. Follow his instructions to tuck your legs around his sides, but not pinch him with your heels thankyouverymuch, to lean back on the cushy, meaty part of your ass, sway with him.

It helps. A little. If you look down the ground seems far away. You’re completely at his mercy like this, and it is hard to remember how this is typically viewed as subjugation, as taming, especially with the raw power you can tell resides under his skin.

You’re concentrating really hard on the moving part, all the moving parts -your own and his- but then the trees fall away on either side. Your mouth drops open.

There, for as far as you can see, is a field of golden grass. It goes on until it’s lost beyond the horizon. Wind races towards you, flatting everything in a silver lick, tosses John’s hair back to catch on your eyelashes.

“Nice, huh?” he says, low and happy. “I love this place.”

It’s gorgeous. You breathe. Now, _here_ , you can breathe, deeply and freely and no one is there to tell you not to. Never understood you’d been choking for years. You stay nothing, just drink in the openness as you stare yearningly over his shoulder.

“Hey so…” John glances at you, and you can feel sheer energy coil under his skin. His eyes are the exact damn shade of the sky. “Do you trust me?”

What a question. Do you trust him? You do. You would never have gotten on his back if you hadn’t. “Yeah,” you tell him.

John smiles, his whole face lighting up with elation. “Awesome. Hold on tight!”

“John? John—what the wHOAA!”

He lunges under you. There’s no other word for it. You can feel his weight tilt to settle on his powerful hindquarters, can feel him thrum as every muscle in his body draws taut in a split second of lightning sharp anticipation -and then all of that flies forward in a whirl of vertigo. Your world goes jumbled and blazing.

It’s so fast, so sudden you’re convinced you’re going to slide right off his back and crash into the ground -you don’t, somehow you managed to adhere yourself to his back, arms around his ribs and hooked back up to grip his shoulders.

His hooves hit the ground, a fourbeat that rattles your teeth together, and then he’s suspended again, big, powerful contractions and expansions of his whole body, again, and again, so fast, too fast. You press your face into the nape of his neck, get a face full of thick wiry hair, and hold on as tight as you ever have before you fall and break something. Your legs. Your neck.

But you don’t. You don’t fall. You can feel him work against and under you, but there’s a heady cadence to it, a pulse, primal and fast and merciless like the beat of your heart.

You understand how hooves supposedly can thunder.

Each time he strikes the earth you can feel it in the core of your body. He’s leaning into it, drawing you along where you’re clinging to his back to duck under the wind. 

You’re not falling. You pry your face out of his neck.

At either side the world flies by in a gilded blur. The blue sky calls. The sheer force of the air coursing past your face forces wetness from your eyes.

It’s exhilarating. You’re not falling.

“Can-“ the word is stolen from your lips, falls lost into the grass far behind you. You put your mouth against the corner of his jaw to be heard: “Is this the fastest you can go?”

John laughs, wild. “Not _even_.”

He’s not joking either. If he was galloping before, you have no idea what he’s doing now. It’s like he’s flying -his hooves will hit the grass and then he’s lifting away, long streaking strides. It’s sheer ecstasy of motion.

You’ve never felt so free.

There’s a tree up ahead, a lone leaning giant lost in the sea of grass. John’s aiming for it, and sooner than you know its hurtling towards you at frighting speed. Despite his impressive start, his braking is less than elegant. Doesn’t slow down like a normal person, allowing his momentum to die away naturally, no, sort of coughs to a halt into these short bursts where he’ll lean through his hind legs, furrowing the grass in his wake. 

Stops with a hop, a skip, a laugh.

Both of you are breathing hard. You’re sweating and your face is wet and ruddy from the friction. John’s flanks pump harshly, echoed by his exhales.

“Whoo!” he yells, fist pumping and dancing in place. “That was so awesome!”

You cling to his back, feeling his heart hammer through his spine and in tandem with yours. It was more than just awesome. Carelessly, you wrench around to look back where you came from, planting the heel of your hand on -well, it’s not his butt, so. More like the pre-butt part? What’s it even called. The axis of his hips, maybe, because tightly packed muscle groups in his hind legs point up towards it.

The forest is barely a streak in the distance. Seems whole a world ago, a lifetime. 

John helpfully rotates, you unwinding easy with him so you both face the same direction. 

“That was awesome, right?” John demands, grinning all his teeth bare at you.

You distain to answer, but only because you’re trying, and failing, to hide your own grin.

“Hehe,” John winks, and gestures at the golden field with an ostentatious sweep of his hand. “Look, Simba. Everything the light touches is our kingdom.”

“Holy shit, put me down, you’re not allowed to quote the Lion King at me.”

Snickering, he trots over to the tree. Okay, that’s less than comfortable. You bounce awkwardly on his back like a sack of potatoes. “…ow ow ow my dick!”

“Whoops, sorry, buddy,” he stops, and lends you his arm so you can slide in a controlled fall off his back. Your feet hit the ground first and you find you can hardly stand, you’re shaking so damn hard.

To make the picture even more appetising the backs of your thighs and ass are carpeted with a fine layer of black hair. Okay, that’s a kind of a really big fucking problem. Maybe you can tie your hoodie around your waist like a complete 90s pillock. Should cover most of it. You hope. Dare not even contemplate what would happen if anybody found out what the two of you just did. 

You rode him. And it was the best thing that ever happened to you.

Your legs give out from sheer emotion and physical exhaustion. The grass is thick and fragrant. You twine both fists around handfuls and hold on tight to stop reeling.

This moment will remain a bright kernel of happiness nestled deep in your chest for the rest of your life. Years will pass, and you’ll grow old and different and you’ll change, but you just know that you’d only have to glimpse a blue sky or a black horse, a boy with blue eyes and you’ll _remember_. Remember that for a precious moment you’ve known what it was like to be free.

Your throat is dry, and John’s must be parched, but you left your pack at the edge of the forest with your bike. He’s standing there, hooves planted and chest out, lost in thought and ears pricked.

Shit, is he going to keep standing? That’d be awkward. It occurs to you you’ve seen him sit like, _once_. Other than that he’s always on his four feet. Almost as if to disprove that whole line of thought he walks over, sinks through his legs with surprising elegance, upper body comfortably propped up against the trunk.

He smiles, lazy and happy and satisfied, like he just got everything he wanted, and you don’t look away. You can still feel the pounding of his heart all through your body, like it might not have really left.

Maybe you should say something, thank him, but it was so powerful, so frightfully intimate you don’t want to break it with rough blither from your rude wordhole. He knows. You know he knows, it’s there on his face. 

It’s warm, and John’s eyes lid until they fail to open. His breathing is still somewhat clipped, and the smile hasn’t left his face. With his eyes closed you can watch him. Study him. Admire him.

John is handsome.

This is something that’s simply true. His face is made up out of strong, pleasing angles, and his blue eyes pop against his tanned skin. His hair is thick and looks made to bury hands in. Everything about him is steeped in sheer energy, _powerful_ , biceps clearly outlined even under the loose cut of his shirt. When he breathes his belly tightens around defined muscle groups. That’s the… the human part of him.

The horse part. Well. He’s so black he gleams blue-edged, and the hairs of his coat are sleek. Muscle is evident here as well, with arteries lying close under the skin. His tail is a fanned out behind him -your eyes politely skip away from his lower belly. One of his front legs is tucked up close to his chest, the other sprawled out, hoof nearly nudging your knee. Without pausing to ask your brain for directions your hand is reaching—

No. Wow, what the fuck. 

You jerk it back, horrified at yourself.

“Go ahead.” 

Oh shit. He saw. He’s got one eye half-open and is watching you, seemingly highly amused. You don’t understand how he can stand to be so casual about it.

You want to. You’re so curious. But he’s not a thing or something half-animal that you can prod and poke around to see how it ticks.

“I don’t bite,” he adds, and you flinch. The old scar on your upper chest crawls. 

He didn’t let you fall.

When your fingers first make contact with the long, elegant stretch of his lower leg you’re shocked how it’s just bone. Bone, lined at the back with a power tendon and covered with skin and fur. In fact, you’re slightly horrified to find you can slot your thumb between bone and muscle at one side, your index on the other and nearly pinch them together.

It’s only at the meaty part of his shoulder that there’s some merciful padding, pure muscle that rolls under your hands. John hums, like it feels good, mouth curving. Well. Alright. You park yourself closer and stroke him. His fur is so closely packed together and silky smooth your fingers seem to skate along of their own accord. There’s a distinct patch of scruffy hair behind his whithers. No wonder, half of it is sticking to your ass.

You’ve tucked your fingers into the shadowy, hidden part between his front legs, he’s almost downy there, when you realize you can feel his pulse. 

Surprised, you look up, and his face is almost naked with an unknowable fear that you understand nontheless. The taste of your own mortality rises in your mouth like hunger, straining against how delicate, how intense this is.

John looks away first, blinking fast. 

You lean down, body unfurling in the thick grass, and press your cheek into his side. It takes you a moment to hear it over the victorious roaring of your own, but there it is -his second heart.

“Well, fuck me. You really do have two,” you murmur.

“And two lungs. Well four, you know,” he whispers back.

“Two sets,” you correct softly.

“You know what I mean,” he grumbles.

The moment stretches on too long to pass for mere scientific interest, but you don’t lift your head and he doesn’t say anything about it. He’s really warm and yes, he smells distinctly like horse. It’s not nearly as unpleasant as you thought it’d be, just musky and alive. Nice. You breathe in deeply, filling your lungs with it. With him.

There’s no way anyone can look at you and not know you’ve been all over him.

It’s hard to care when John’s fingers tickle at the edges of your hair, so cautiously, before he actually dares to caress you. His fingers are shaking, and your eyes become hot and hazy as your chest goes tight to accommodate the miasma of hopeless confusion roiling behind your sternum.

The sun flickers over your face, and your arm somehow wound up around his front legs, hugging them to your body. It’s an unfairly perfect moment and you don’t know what to do about it. You like him.

You went looking for trouble, and damn if you didn’t fucking find trouble. You’re wallowing in it, in fact, you’re going to be covered in trouble’s shiny black fur and scent by the end of the day.

“John?”

“Yeah?”

“Can we do this again?”

The pad of his thumb traces the curve of your ear, affectionate.

“Sure,” he says. “I’d like that.”

- _fin_ -


End file.
